Of (Money) Monsters and Men
by Laughing.Thalia
Summary: Thousands if not millions of people had been watching Money Monster when he had a gun held to his head by a presumed crazy guy. He had begged pleaded with those people to buy shares that were worth less than 9 and people sold their stock instead. How much was a life worth? A lot. How much was his life worth? Apparently not much. THIS THE ONLY MONEY MONSTER FIC ON AO3 and FF.N


It was the middle of the night and Lee was sitting alone in the Money Monster studio a gun in one hand and a glass of scotch in the other. He had managed to figure out how to get one of the cameras turned on and turned on a single spotlight, not wanting to alert security to his presence.

He stared blankly at one of the 3 cameras "The name is Lee Gates. The show is Money Monster. The day is 20th June 2016." He stopped for a second, trying to thing through the alcoholic haze, the drink in his hand had not been his first and if the bottle just outside off frame was anything to go by it wouldn't be his last either. "Less then a week ago, I sat here with a man holding a gun to my head and a bomb strapped to my chest and I appealed to the millions of people all over the world who were watching the news. Who were watching me get taken hostage. A little under a week ago I sat at this very desk looking into this very camera and I begged, I pleaded to spend eight measly dollars on stock to save the lives of the people in this building, to save _my_ life and the stock went down."

He waved the gun around as if gesturing with his hand "Not one person could spare eight dollars to save a life and I think that's terrible. I think if that's the world we live in I don't want to live in it." He chugged down his cup of scotch and poured himself another glass "then it occurred to me. People spend eight dollars on people in need all the time. people spend eighty dollars on people who should be saved and then it hit me I don't live in a world where one person won't help their fellow man because of greed or the love of money, no I live in a world where my fellow man won't give up eight dollars to save _my_ life. Specifically my life. And I know why." He took a gulp of his drink "I'm an asshole! I'm a selfish ever thought of anyone other then myself my whole life and I made a business in screwing people over, I made you think I was some sort of Stock genius but I'm as clueless as you! What do I know about Stock trading? Jack shit that's what. You'd be better off trading off your own assessments of the stock market. I am a terrible, terrible human being and the one good thing I ever did in my life, exposing Walt Camby for his crimes, I did to save my own god damn life. And I put thousands in danger whilst doing so, bringing Kyle into the streets with a gun and a bomb, fake of not, people could have been killed."

He stopped for half a minute, slowly sipping his drink "Kyle wasn't evil. He just wanted to know where his money went. He wanted the truth for every one and he died for the truth. Some of you may say he's a terrorist or a lunatic but he opened my eyes and that doesn't sound very reassuring seeing as I'm sitting here with a gun to my head getting drunk but he's made the most sense out of every one I've ever met in my life. He wasn't a bad guy, he just had a terrible girlfriend." he scoffed.

He heard a sound coming from outside "I'm going to give half my money to Patty, Lenny and all the rest of the crew who stayed here when there was a freaking bomb and the other half will be split between my kids collage fund and a charity of their choice. Now I'm going to put this bullet in my brain and it's going to be on the news and it will trend on Twitter and maybe people will mourn and maybe people will call me an attention seeking faggot for doing this and than, in a couple of days, a week, a month if I'm lucky, people will forget I even existed and I'll fade into history the way so many do. And Patty Fenn the _wonderful_ Patty Fenn will be the only one who will actually care that I'm dead."

A security guard shone a light through the window "oi! Who's in there?!"

Lee Gates didn't reply. He simply chugged his drink, raised the gun to his temple and pulled the trigger.


End file.
